The invention relates generally to organizing objects, such as email and files. More particularly, the invention relates to providing a list of actions that is specific to a controlling attribute and that is dynamically sorted according to a sort criterion. For example, the actions of the list can be movement of email into different folders. The controlling attribute can be the sender of a current email. The sort criterion can be the folders into which the user most recently moved email from this sender.
A common complaint of computer users is colloquially known as xe2x80x9cinformation overload.xe2x80x9d Users complain that they receive too much email, and generate too many computer files, such as word processing files, spreadsheet files, and other types of files. One of the primary reasons why too much information is a problem for users is that they have difficulty organizing the information in a way that enables them later to easily locate a particular piece of information. For example, with respect to email, users may often receive nearly one-hundred email messages or more a day. The organizational scheme to which many users default is to delete unwanted email, and keep other email in the in-box folder in which they originally appeared.
Current email computer programs usually provide users with the ability to organize email into a hierarchy of folders. For example, a user may create a series of folders by project name. Sub-folders within these folders may then be created for the phases of each project. However, even with this capability, many users choose not to manually sort email into folders, even though they know that doing so would allow them to subsequently retrieve desired information more quickly. When asked, many users indicate that they do not sort email into folders because of the amount of effort that is required both initially and on a continuing basis to create and maintain a cogent organizational folder scheme.
One recent innovation in some email computer programs has been the most-recently-moved-to (MRMT) list of folders. This list has a number of entries corresponding to folders into which the user has most recently moved email. The first entry of the list corresponds to the folder into which the user has most recently moved email, the second entry corresponds to the folder into which the user has second most recently moved email, and so on. If the user has in place some organizational folder scheme for email, email movement into these folders is more easily accomplished by using the MRMT list. Email is typically moved to some folders more often than to other folders. Using the MRMT list means that the user is able to select the folder into which to move email from a relatively short list of most likely intended folders, rather than from the list of all possible folders, which can be quite large.
However, the MRMT list is limited. In particular, the list implicitly assumes that the user is likely to move new email to a folder into which other email has been most recently moved. The list does not take into consideration, for instance, that some email is never likely to be moved into some folders. For example, a user may occasionally receive email from friends, which the user may want to save in one or more personal-specific folders. However, the user may have more recently received a flurry of business-related email that were moved to business-specific folders. The MRMT list in this situation would not include folders into which the user would want to move email subsequently received from a friend. This is because the business-specific folders would likely populate the list, such that it would not include any personal-specific folders.
In sum, the MRMT list is a first step towards solving the problem of information overload, but is by no means the final say in empowering users to easily organize their information for subsequent fast retrieval. The MRMT list is useful for what it does, but is limited in the benefits it provides to computer users. For these and other reasons, there is a need for the present invention.
The invention relates to improving object organization by presenting controlling attribute-specific lists. For example, the object can be an email, and controlling attribute can be the sender of the email. Sender-specific lists of folders into which email have been moved are dynamically maintained. The lists are ordered based on a sort criterion, such as the most recent or most frequent folders into which email from the senders have been moved. When an email is moved, the list corresponding to the sender of the email is updated. A particular sender-specific list can be invoked to display the list to the user. For example, the user can press a button to show the list corresponding to the sender of the email that the user wants to move. As another example, the list corresponding to the sender of an email can be automatically shown when the email received is selected. The list may also be combined with a non-sender-specific list.
By displaying controlling attribute-specific lists, the invention provides users with relevant possible alternatives as to how an action can be performed relative to a given object. More specifically, with respect to email organized into folders, the invention providers users with relevant folders into which a given email may be moved. For example, email from a work colleague that are typically organized into business-related folders may yield a list of the most recent business-related folders into which email from the colleague have been moved.
As another example, email from a friend that are typically organized into personal-related folders may yield a list of the most recent personal-related folders into which email from the friend have been moved. Even if an email is received from the friend after a large number of email from the work colleague have been moved into business-related folders, the sender-specific list corresponding to the friend would still include only the personal-related folders. In this way, the user is provided a more relevant list of folders into which to move the email from the friend. This list would not include the business-related folders, even though more recently other email may have been moved into them, because the user would have not recently moved prior email from the friend into these folders.
Besides the embodiments, aspects, and advantages described in the summary, other embodiments, aspects, and advantages of the invention will become apparent by reading the detailed description and by referencing the drawings.